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Best way to house train a 7 year old dog, is it possible?

Hello everyone,

I am new here! Have just adopted a 7 year old jack Russell, Rosie. She is a lovely very sweet natured dog, perhaps a little on the timid side which is probably to be expected after having at least 3 owners that I know of.

Anyhow, the only prob I am having so far (apart from her being severly underweight but that's a whole other issue!) is that she is not house trained at all.

I have been watching her for signals but obviously I am missing them, so I am just taking her outside at key times, say 30 min after food and before I go out, howver this is not catching all the toilet times and there have been a few accidents so far.

So, best tips for toilet training a 7 year old dog? I go back to work in a week so she will be alone for 4 full days per week. Happy to look into a penned off area of the house or let her roam. Also can use a doggy pad as I don't think she will old on. Ideally I would like for her to let me know she needs to go out by barking, but I dontbthink she has the confidence to do this.

Older dogs are harder because they don't need to go every 1/2 hour like pups do, but you can still take her out first thing in the morning, after meals or playtime, at midday or after she has been asleep for a while. You can teach her a command--JRs are very smart so she will catch on quickly if you start using a cue word when she goes. Give her a treat after as well. She may use a wee pad but you want to encourage her to go outside as much as you can, or she will think that she can go wherever she wants. Can you install a dog door?

I have retrained a few older Rescues and i use the umbilical system with them........And very basic back to puppy toilet training, every half hour the first day and longer and longer as the days progress. Of course the really positive reward bit comes into it too. but i have found with shy and timid dogs that the quieter smile/food reward works better, no happy excitement, it scares them to death . I just have them attached to me all day when they are inside....it also works really well for bonding. it is very tedious at times and takes some commitment and care with a little dog ( so you do not step on them). But so far I have had no failures. My last newfie boy was very timid. And we found that we had to search a little to find something he really enjoyed to make it his ultimate reward..........It was jumping up to greet......So we taught him that on command, and when he got a little anxious we would offer it to him and he would almost instantly be calmer and less anxious. Now that has come down to shaking a paw.......So when i see he is anxious/nervous, I say "give me five" and he does and seems to calm and get happy. With my Annabelle, who was also anxious, I found she loved (and still does) to jump on a box.....So when she get anxious/stressed i try to find a box or just even a very small step or such and get her to "table", she calms down and gets silly/happy, forgets about being anxious. Find something your little JR likes and use it in that manner. Even a favourite toy or teach her a little trick she is really good at. It is a very good way to distract and retrain an anxious dog. Also read books about calming signs......sometimes if you use them on your dog when they are stressed, they also work really well. I use them a lot........I "cheat" with them in trails on my more anxious/stressed dogs like Annabelle (also a Rescue).

I found it just so much easier to leave the back door ajar instead of trying to get the dog to tell me when they need to go out... The first thing I will do when we move into our own home next year is to install a doggy door. I would highly recommend either of those options for your situation. Instead of leaving her in the house when you are out at work, do you have a garage she can stay in with access to the outdoors?

Thanks for the suggestions so far, I can possibly install a doggy door in my front door, but that will be a last option as the front yard is not 100% doggy proofed. I was (perhaps stupidly) hoping that she and my chook would get along and that they could share the back yard, but I realize now that is a long way off, if ever!

I don't have a garage, but I do have another side yard (could potentially doggy door that yard) but it is all concreted and rocks.. I guess that is a possibility which is better than nothing.

I have been giving her treats, however because of her weight(4.1kg when we got her) she is often not hungry because I have been feeding her so much, so she will take the treat and then leave it on the grass and come back to it later. I am hesitant to lessen or drop a feed at this stage.

Thanks for the suggestions so far, I can possibly install a doggy door in my front door, but that will be a last option as the front yard is not 100% doggy proofed. I was (perhaps stupidly) hoping that she and my chook would get along and that they could share the back yard, but I realize now that is a long way off, if ever!

I don't have a garage, but I do have another side yard (could potentially doggy door that yard) but it is all concreted and rocks.. I guess that is a possibility which is better than nothing.

I have been giving her treats, however because of her weight(4.1kg when we got her) she is often not hungry because I have been feeding her so much, so she will take the treat and then leave it on the grass and come back to it later. I am hesitant to lessen or drop a feed at this stage.

One of my newfies came to me at 32 kg, when she should have been 50-55kg......But I still did the "nothing in life is for free'' system with her. She was also not toilet trained and had not timidity, but aggression problems (not fear).....So you can get the weight up and train. Just use all of some of the food for training. I used to decide on how much she would get that day, put it in the fridge and train all day, left-overs were fed out in a happy training session. Some dogs i feed from a bowl and from the hand, again I put out the days food and use it during the day, left-overs are given at the end of the day.

We actually have always had a doggy door, but when dogs are not potty trained they will still do it inside, often hiding it. They just have no idea.......They do not mean to be bad, just have not been shown the where is acceptable. The most important thing is to not react to mistakes, just clean well and go back to training.......Use the mantra "bad owner, you missed it again" LOL......